Book Recommendation: Small Wars, Faraway Places: Global
Insurrection and the Making of the Modern World, 1945-1965 by Michael Burleigh
This terrific book was given to me from my best friend from
high school. By a British author, it is well-written, well-researched and
well-balanced. It will be especially appreciated by military history buffs and
political junkies, as it deals with not only the many conflicts in this period,
but the international political decisions around them, how the "cold
war" developed, and exposes the seeds of our present troubles. Those who
tend to view history through a strict right- or leftwing prism will find
details here to confirm their beliefs and details they will need to dismiss to
prevent cognitive dissonance. Burleigh is even-handed in parceling out praise
or sharp criticism to the historical figures involved, and does not go easy on
the British ones, including icons such as Churchill. He is unsentimental about
colonialism, detailing both the savagery of the "civilized" colonial
powers and the brutality of the governments and leaders the colonials displaced.
I rate this a must-read. This is not to suggest I endorse every opinion he
expresses. In many areas, I do not have access to the facts he draws on. In
areas I have read a lot about, like Vietnam , there are other
interpretations that should be considered, for example: Triumph Forsaken:
The Vietnam War, 1954-1965 by
Mark Moyar.
http://www.amazon.com/Triumph-Forsaken-The-Vietnam-1954-1965/dp/0521757630/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1400263927&sr=8-1&keywords=Triumph+Forsaken%3A+The+Vietnam+War%2C+1954-1965+by
~Bob
My letter to the ELCA Malaria Campaign
A Bit of Colored
Ribbon by Robert A. Hall
My view of the future of Detroit and our other large cities, in a
short "science fiction" story I published in 1998. Enjoy. ~Bob
Excerpt: T he recent escalating arguments over whether there
should be further congressional hearings on Benghazi are troubling. The fact that there
are substantial numbers of people who feel that there is nothing more to
investigate when four American lives were lost and no one has answered for this
crime provides an indication of how far our sense of justice has slipped.
This should not be a partisan issue, because the
implications of ignoring or prevaricating about the underlying mistakes will
have far-reaching consequences.
42-year-old ID'd as
wrong-way driver who killed Mesa
Excerpt: Officials have identified the driver of the vehicle
that struck and killed an off-duty Mesa
police officer early Monday after driving more than
30 miles in the wrong direction on Interstate 10. Raul Silva Corona, 42, has
been identified as the driver of the vehicle that fatally collided
with Officer Brandon Mendoza, 32, said Cari Gerchick, the
communications director for Maricopa
County
Excerpt: France ’s
attempt to sell warships to Russia
is both a “sell the rope to hang themselves” moment and a comment on U.S.
stature these days. The
New York Times: In a closed-door meeting in February 2010, Defense
Secretary Robert M. Gates urged his French counterpart not to proceed with the
sale of two amphibious assault ships to Russia
because it “would send the wrong message to Russia and to our allies in Central
and East Europe.
The Insiders: Bernie
Sanders vs. the Koch brothers. By Ed Rogers
Excerpt: We don’t hear too much from socialist Sen. Bernie
Sanders (I-Vt). He is a low-key, reliable member of the left-wing majority in
the Senate, a classic old-school liberal among liberals. The only noise he ever
makes is the occasional golf clap in support of the growing entitlement
culture. But on Friday, someone gave him a wacky Democratic talking point
linking the Koch brothers to the Veterans Affairs scandal. That’s right: He
suggests that the malicious neglect at the VA is somehow the Koch brothers’
fault. (It is to laugh. for the Left, the Koch Brothers have replaced George
Bush and Global warming as the entity to blame for everything they see as evil.
Their heavy hitters in money, of course, are above reproach. ~Bob)
The Big Immigration
Problem No One's Talking About
Excerpt: But even those who are apprehended for additional
crimes may not be held. Here is a big problem no one is talking about:
Criminals are being released.
According to a recent report conducted
by the Center for Immigration Studies, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement
(ICE) released more than 30,000 convicted criminal aliens from custody in 2013.
That’s right — the agency in charge of securing our nation’s border decided to
set free 36,007 violent and incarcerated individuals back into society. Some of
the changes levied against these individuals include homicide, sexual assault,
kidnapping, and aggravated assault, just to name a few.
.
Illegals Freed By
Obama Later Commit 19 Murders
http://www.wnd.com/2014/05/illegals-freed-by-obama-later-commit-19-murders/
http://www.wnd.com/2014/05/illegals-freed-by-obama-later-commit-19-murders/
Excerpt: Criminal illegal aliens released by the Obama
administration between 2009 and 2011 went on to be charged with 19 murders,
three attempted murders and 142 sex crimes, a House Judiciary Committee report
previously documented.
The most segregated
schools may not be in the states you’d expect
Excerpt: The Northeast was the only region where, on
average, the share of black students in almost completely minority schools has
risen since 1968, according to the report titled “Brown at 60: Great Progress,
a Long Retreat and an Uncertain Future.” More than half — 51.4 percent — of
black students in those states in 2011 were in schools whose student
populations were 90 percent to 100 percent minorities. In every other
region of the country — the Midwest, West, South and “border” states — black
students today are less likely to be in heavily minority schools.
Only half of young
Obama voters are prepared to vote for Democrats
Excerpt: In case there was any doubt
that the youth vote
could hurt Democrats in 2014, the following two charts should just
about kill it. ... What's most notable here: Only half of young people who
voted for Obama say there is even a chance that they'll vote in 2014 and
that their vote would be for Democrats. (Guess they turned into racists. ~Bob)
Scientists in
cover-up of ‘damaging’ climate http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/science/article4091344.ece
Excerpt: Research which heaped
doubt on the rate of global warming was deliberately suppressed by scientists
because it was “less than helpful” to their cause, it was claimed last night. In
an echo of the infamous “Climategate” scandal at the University of East Anglia UK Del
Great news from Jeb
Bush: I’ll govern like Lyndon Johnson did
Excerpt: You’d think a guy who’ll be attacked endlessly for
his brother’s policies on Iraq
wouldn’t want to tie himself to the president responsible for Vietnam too. In
fairness, he’s talking about governing
style here, not policy substance. But why he’d feel obliged to mention LBJ
at all in making this point, I have no idea.
Gender Pay Inequality on the Left: New York Times
Fires Female Editor For Being Bossy And Demanding Equal Pay. By John Hayward
As always with liberals, it's "do as I say, not as I
do." ~Bob. Excerpt: The entire point of Democrats’ dopey “War on Women”
rhetoric, which the New York Times fully supports, is
that nothing else matters when comparing the pay of men and women.
Only hard, cold dollars and cents paycheck totals are to be
considered. ... After enjoying a frothy mug of schadenfreude over the
pickle the New York Times finds itself in, we might reflect that this
is really a story about cloistered liberals growing up, and learning
how their ideology is a poor fit for the real world, where complex situations
cannot easily be reduced to cartoons about patriarchy, sexism, and
racism.
New York Times
publisher Sulzberger fights back, weakly
Excerpt: As any crisis communications consultant will note,
a company is in a crisis when it’s forced to publicly compare the compensation
levels of key departed executives. And that’s precisely the situation in which
New York Times Publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. found himself today.
Jill Abramson And The Times: What Went Wrong? By Ken Auletta
Excerpt: Let’s look at some numbers I’ve been given: As executive
editor, Abramson’s starting salary in 2011 was $475,000, compared to Keller’s
salary that year, $559,000. Her salary was raised to $503,000, and—only after
she protested—was raised again to $525,000. She learned that her salary as
managing editor, $398,000, was less than that of the male managing editor for
news operations, John Geddes. She also learned that her salary as Washington
bureau chief, from 2000 to 2003, was a hundred thousand dollars less than that
of her successor in that position, Phil Taubman.** (Murphy would say only that
Abramson’s compensation was “broadly comparable” to that of Taubman and
Geddes.)
The Inconvenient Truth about Climate Change. By Peter Morici
Excerpt: Climate change cannot be denied. The inconvenient
truth President Obama refuses to accept is that U.S.
efforts to significantly alter its course are fruitless, and severely handicap America 's
ability to mitigate its consequences. The global climate has gone through
profound cycles of cooling and warming since long before humans walked the
earth.
Mayor of Youngstown , OH
Excerpt: Yesterday brought the announcement that a handful
of corrupt Ohio Democrats had been indicted for being, well, corrupt. And it
also brought us another energetic round of “Name That Party,” a parlor game in
which a corrupt official is arrested or indicted and we, the contestants, try
to find a hint of which party to which they belong. (When a Republican is
indicted, it's in the first paragraph. If it's a Democrat, often not mentioned
in the story. Just as if a Marine vet or Vietnam vet who commits a murder, it's
the first thing you learn, but if a Muslim, illegal immigrant or another
minority does, it's often impossible to tell that from the news story. ~Bob)
Excerpt: A new
Fox News poll finds that 51 percent think that Obama administration
“knowingly lied” about the September
11, 2012 terrorist attacks on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya
“to help the President Obama during his re-election campaign” against Mitt
Romney.
Family cat saves
young boy from dog attack
http://www.wjla.com/articles/2014/05/family-cat-saves-young-boy-from-pitbull-attack-video--103120.html
http://www.wjla.com/articles/2014/05/family-cat-saves-young-boy-from-pitbull-attack-video--103120.html
In case you are the only person on Earth who missed this
clip. ~Bob
What’s going on with
the polar ice sheet? A Q&A. By Alexandra Petri
Satire.
WaPo Fact Checker: Obama touts new efficiency rules
in ‘Year of Action,’ after years of delays
Excerpt: Obama’s remarks might have left listeners with the
impression that the Department of Energy is acting quickly to impose new
efficiency rules, without waiting for Congress. But the reality is that these
elements of the “Year of Action” came after years of inaction, at the behest of
the White House. In this case, Congress mandated the rules — and the White
House created the gridlock. Two Pinocchios.
Where Did ’97
Percent’ Global Warming Consensus Figure Come From?
http://dailycaller.com/2014/05/16/where-did-97-percent-global-warming-consensus-figure-come-from/#ixzz31vgWuUiz
http://dailycaller.com/2014/05/16/where-did-97-percent-global-warming-consensus-figure-come-from/#ixzz31vgWuUiz
Excerpt: The University
of Queensland in Australia is
taking legal action to block the release of data used by one of its
scientists to come up with the oft-quoted statistic that 97 percent of climate
scientists agree that mankind is causing global warming.
Excerpt: In the wake the NBA’s proposed lifetime ban and
$2.5 million fine for Donald Sterling, a longtime reader reminded me that I’d
written about another NBA owner, a Black man, who held
a party in which Whites were refused entry and turned away.
And, yet, the NBA did nothing. As I’ve already pointed out, Black racism and
bigotry against Whites, Jews, Mormons, and gays is tolerated by the NBA. (Black racism is so prevalent that
they have to deny it's possible. Frankly, I wouldn't be interested in attending
a party either he or Sterling
was hosting. Rather have a beer or six with some brother Marines, white, black,
brown or yellow. They are my culture. ~Bob)
Excerpt: The suspect reportedly pulled a weapon and shot at
the homeowner, who then produced his own weapon and shot the gunman, who later
died at a local hospital.
11 tips for keeping
your home safe from burglars this summer
Standing up for human rights in
Excerpt: Facing mounting pressure by the international
community and seeking trade and security commitments, the Vietnamese government
recently released five prisoners of conscience. I was one of them. Such
releases are always welcome, but they should not be confused with actual human
rights improvements. (Send John Kerry and Jane Fonda. ~Bob)
Common Core: Obamacare For Education: Making every kid a
left-wing zealot. By Jeffrey Lord
Excerpt: Amid all the swirling controversies over campus
commencement speakers, seemingly in a separate corner of the political universe
another controversy swirls over Common Core. In fact? They are the same
controversy. Not to mention the battle for the 2016 GOP presidential
nomination. You could, in fact, call Common Core Obamacare for
Education. (I had not gotten around to examining the details of the Common
Core arguments, too much else going on. Then along comes this article,
and suddenly things are in very sharp focus. Lesson plans on language usage that
are all couched in political terms? References that make bald political
statements about past Presidents as if it's all authoritative history, like who
won the Civil War? Goebbels would be overjoyed with this. No American
should be anything but shocked (as I was) and then really infuriated (as I
am). That they would DARE to use the educational system for grade and
high school kids to do basic political indoctrination? That is so
un-American that it leaves one near speechless. And to my Liberal friends, if
this had come out ten years earlier, and all the negative references were to
previous Democrat Presidents, and all the indoctrination was for runaway
capitalism, would it have been inappropriate and enraging then? Inserting the
very least form of political indoctrination in the educational system should be
grounds for near-riots all over, no matter what Party was in power. Our
children need to be exposed to the basics of the politics of our Founding, with
all the discussions and conflicts of those times, and from there up to the
Civil War, but by facts, facts, facts, not partisan interpretations. This is
truly (sadly a grossly overused word) and outrage. Time to tell your
Congressmen, all of them, that this is utterly unacceptable, and shame on
anyone who supports it in this form. --Del )
He's Made It Worse:
Obama's Middle East
Excerpt: In the last days of George W. Bush’s presidency,
the Economist delivered a damning assessment: “Abroad, George Bush
has presided over the most catastrophic collapse in America ’s reputation since the
second world war.” In the view of the magazine’s editors, “a president who
believed that America ’s
global supremacy was guaranteed by America ’s unrivalled military power
ended up demonstrating the limits of both.”
Obamacare News
States Begin to Face Overwhelming Obamacare Reality. By Amy Payne
Excerpt: California
is figuring that out. The Los Angeles Times reports that
“Enrollment is expected to exceed previous estimates by 1.4 million, and
administration officials said it would cost the state $1.2 billion more than
originally thought.” That means a lot of states may see budget-busting
additions to earlier estimates, which already predicted that expanding Medicaid
would be costly:
Obama OKs Caps on
Medical Procedures
Excerpt: The Obama administration has approved “reference
pricing” for insurance companies, which means they can put a cap on what health
plans will pay for expensive procedures like knee and hip replacements.
Excerpt: Consumers who purchased new health plans from Blue
Shield of California have sued the insurer, claiming they were misled into
thinking the insurance would cover their desired doctors and hospitals. In
their complaint filed in California state
court on Wednesday, San Francisco residents John
Harrington and Alex Talon accused Blue Shield of misrepresenting that their
plans, sold on California 's
health exchange, would cover the full provider network advertised on the
company's website.
Religion of Peace News
Christian in Sudan
Interview with her husband. ~Bob. Excerpt: "I'm so
frustrated. I don't know what to do," Daniel Wani told CNN on Thursday.
"I'm just praying." His wife, Meriam Yehya Ibrahim, 27, was convicted
by a Khartoum
court this week of apostasy, or the renunciation of faith. Ibrahim is
Christian, her husband said. But the court considers her to be Muslim. ...
According to the rights group Amnesty International, she was also convicted of adultery
and sentenced to 100 lashes because her marriage to a Christian man is
considered void under Sharia law. ... Ibrahim is eight months' pregnant and is
in custody with her 20-month-old son, according to Amnesty International, which
considers her a prisoner of conscience.
Obama Administration
Threatened Nigeria
Excerpt: Soon after John Kerry took over as Secretary of
State, the U.S. Ambassador to Nigeria ,
Terence P. McCulley, accused the Nigerian government of butchery during a
confrontation with Boko Haram terrorists in Baga, a Nigerian town on the shores
of Lake Chad, and in May 2013 threatened
to withdraw U.S.
military aid from the West African nation.
Hamas-linked CAIR
offers free Qur’ans to counter AFDI ad about Islamic anti-Semitism.
By Robert Spencer
Excerpt: This is a great idea. I’m all for the public’s having a better understanding of the
Qur’an. Nihad Awad of Hamas-linked CAIR lists a few of the Qur’an verses
about Islam’s view of Jews and Judaism that people will encounter in their free
Qur’an, but he left out a few. Here they are, from the translation (by Muhammad
Asad) that CAIR is giving out. Don’t thank me, Nihad. I’m happy to help. 2:65 Allah transforms disobedient Jews into apes
The British face of
Boko Haram: Man suspected of masterminding bomb attacks in Nigeria was
radicalised in Glamorgan
Excerpt: A British-born man suspected of masterminding Boko
Haram bomb attacks in Nigeria
that left around 100 people dead became radicalised during his years at a Welsh
university, it has been claimed.
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